New Atlanta Restaurant Serves Mid-Century Modern Identity

In 1965, architect and real estate developer, John Portman unveiled Peachtree Center in downtown Atlanta – a large-scale, mixed-use development comprised of convention hotels, shopping galleries, and commercial office buildings. The complex also housed The Midnight Sun, a fine dining destination offering Danish haute cuisine in a mid-century modern setting. After a change in ownership lasting several decades, Portman Holdings recently reacquired one of the buildings in the complex – 230 Peachtree – for adaptive reuse. The refurbished mixed-use tower is once again home to a destination restaurant – JP Atlanta – which showcases creative American cuisine and boasts a modernist interior with a glass-canopied bar and a ceiling featuring a stainless steel mesh spiral encircling the dining area.

Poulin + Morris collaborated with John Portman & Associates in developing a comprehensive branding program for the new restaurant. The logotype utilizes the same mid-century modern inspired typeface used in the environmental graphics and wayfinding program newly created for 230 Peachtree. The restaurant’s print material, including menus, gift cards, stationery, coasters, and packaging, features “JP” framed within brackets and set against a dynamic background of enlarged, abstracted letterforms of the logotype. A sinuous, line pattern taken from the restaurant’s custom carpet appears on clipboards and is visible through transparent, vellum menus which are printed in 3 different colors pulled from the restaurant’s interior color palette differentiating breakfast, lunch, and dinner offerings. Plans are also underway for expanding the JP Restaurant brand to hotel properties in Denver CO, Charlotte NC, and San Diego CA.